Funnily enough lots of people still do although we don't any more.

Elderly people often do.

My mom's 90. She BACSes it. Super silver surfer!

How odd. When I first became aware (about a week before the election) I contacted the Southwark Council electoral office, as I was concerned that because I had only moved into SE15 in March, perhaps I was too late for the election.

However, I recall quite clearly having filled in my new electoral roll registration form in March and it said on there the deadline for inclusion in this year's May elections was 26 April.

Southwark Electoral Services emailed me to say that all cards had been sent out in one batch at the end of April.

Then when I spoke to the Peckham Delivery Office manager he said that he had personally delivered all the electoral voting cards to my block of flats and he remembered doing so.

He then asked me could I check with a neighbour (I live in flat no.2) so he suggested I check with either Flat 1 or Flat 3 whether my card had gone into their doors instead.

I did not actually do that, as I thought it was a stupid question, if he was insisting that he delivered all the polling cards himself, that he might have actually bothered to deliver them to the correctly numbered doors !!!


Perhaps the truth is that actually the Peckham delivery chaps are LAZY and were feeling too darn lazy to deliver 100s of electoral poll cards to numerous flats on a Peckham estate (I am in a privately owned flat within a council estate), as it would be too much bother dropping every single card through every single flat letter box. (Every flat has an individual front door and walkway leading to it.)

Lazy, lazy, lazy !!!

And then they think that "no one will notice" because we're all unemployed benefit scroungers in the council flats, and not interested in voting.

Ha ha -- caught you out, you stupid lazy delivery men -- I was very much interested in exercising my democratic right to vote and contact both the post office and Southwark Council Electoral Services about the NON appearing electoral voting card !!!!!

We've had a lot of post opened and taken from in the past. Including a free sample from Dove they sent as a "birthday gift" to my mum

We complained, nothing happened.

I think it's disgraceful that some posters are acting as though this is the fault of those sending the money. The point is, we should be able to put whatever the bloody hell we want in the post (provided it's legal ) and it should arrive at the stated destination. That is the service that we are paying for. I'm astonished at how frequently this appears to happen, and how so many people are eager to say it's the fault of the customer, not the thieving b*stards who have taken the money!

Other forms of sending money may not be appropriate to everybody; many elderly people do not have internet access. Hell, my grandmother doesn't even have a computer! And even those that do may be unwilling to trust sending money over the internet. Something needs to be done about this, and the answer should not simply be that people cannot send money through the post.

OP, I would contact the local paper if I were you.

Yeah, pull on the heart strings of the OMG THINK OF THE CHILDRUNNNNNNN brigade by having your faux-distraught teenage son and his mother in the local rag all because he can't get the guitar he was looking forward to because some thieving barstools have stolen his birthday money.

Nothing like a bit of child-related drama to pull on the daily mail.

(Even though most people know not to mail cash).

Money can be sent electronically in branch or over the phone too. It doesn't have to be via the internet.

Yes, you're right, all you need is the sort code and account number of the person you are sending money to.

I think I've spotted a flaw in your approach....

Thanks SO much for the sympathy - thank christ this forum isn't made up totally of plebs like you.
I've no intention of going to the 'local rag' but the police are VERY interested - I can only assume you are one of the delinquent rif raff that work for the 'royal - ahem - mail' - no intelligence required just the ability to thieve off children.
Sleep well

PS to that - thank you all so much for your suport & advice - this is being dealt with but will probably take months rather than weeks to sort out - web site is crap, automated phone line is crap, local P.O. couldn't care less - bit I WILL get this back & get compensation too!
I'll let you know how it pans out - though it could be a while.
THANKS AGAIN

I agree totally.

Probably not to have the money stolen,Sherlock

Exactly. It's a very cynical attitude that some people have, surely people have the right to trust Royal Mail not to nick their stuff!

Well it seems you have already gotten somewhere in sorting this issue out so I wont comment on that but I will tell you that you shouldn't really expect sympathy from this forum, most of the time anyway. A lot of people will, and have, simply ignore the fact that the money was STOLEN and instead blame you, and the people who sent the money, for doing just that. I do agree that money should not be sent through the post but it HAS, and I'm sure there are many more in the country who also do it, so that is not a valid excuse. The royal mail is there to deliver our mail, not to steal, lie and invade people's privacy.

If I were you, I would make sure that money does not get sent through the post again to avoid situations like this. You sound like you've already taken steps to getting the money back so good luck with that

I had a feeling they might be and I reckon it will turn out that you are not the only one to have called them. Let us know how you get on.

My local sorting office is Woolwich, SE28. Most of them are also thieving scumbags.

If I had to put numbers on it, I'd estimate around 1/5 of the DVD's I've ordered from play.com never turned up and I had to get play.com to resend them. (And my order history is a couple of hundred long).

And also a few items from Amazon.com got "lost" in the post.

I know - luckily it worked though, maybe they don't want phones!


Having received some cash in the post today, I feel very sheepish at my holier than thou attitude earlier.....apologies OP!

I will let you know the outcome - thanks for your support.
It angers me that people are so judgemental - part of this money was sent by elderly grandparents many miles away - they are upset & certainly can't afford to replace it -which we would never ask them to.
Still we had a good evening despite the bloody royal mail so up yours you thieving b!!!!ards!

''Having received some cash in the post today, I feel very sheepish at my holier than thou attitude earlier.....apologies OP! [/quote]

No probs - I hope it doesn't happen to you I really do!

... I wasn't being sarcastic. They've said for ages that people shouldn't put cash in the mail - but people still do, and that notwithstanding, it really shouldn't be "going missing" at all.

The fact it does, is why people are recommended to send cheques or postal orders, because they are useless to anyone other than the person who is named on the slip, so there is no gain for anyone to steal them.

Surely the police won't do much for you - other than add the details to file, unless there are persistent occasions of theft from the same office or sufficient information to pinpoint a particular individual (which they would then have to prove) you wouldn't get anything out of it other than a "thanks for the information". At least pulling on the public's heart strings might get something, say if a local instrument seller would like a bit of positive publicity and gives him a guitar?

It's really awful your son's had to lose out in this, especially at the age where he is aware he has to work for things and aware of the cost of things, saving up for stuff, and thinking he'd get enough from relatives and stuff to be able to afford it and some pikey steals it, it's bloody awful. And yes, I have had stuff go missing before - fortunately, if it's something you buy online, sellers often have some sense of responsibility and realise that they are still liable if they send you an item and you don't get it, so they'll send another - but even then, that just means the retailer is out of pocket again because no doubt of some pikey scum at RM who has decided to help himself to something you bought.

And I'd recommend you keep the presumptions out of it; I've never worked for the RM, don't agree with the pikeying crap which is blatantly going on in cases like this, and I would never steal from a child of any age (or anyone else for that matter).

Edit: and RM will definitely be useless at dealing with this. They'll probably pass you from pillar to post before sending you a few second class stamps as a good will gesture. Idiots.

Some people are stupid enough to send the card in the brightly coloured envelope they purchased with it. If someone in the delivery chain is looking for an easy target they just pick on the obvious candidate envelopes.

When sending cash in cards try putting in a second envelope that is brown or white and doesn't look like the typical card envelope.

Ha, Its my birthday today as well! Though my cards had money in. :S



Good Luck sorting it!

Uhh, they should still expect it to get to the recipient intact. Sure it happens but there's really no way you can condone this kind of theft.